


Vignettes

by StrivingArtist



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Either very very fluffy, Ficlets, M/M, Various things, not really any in between, or very very angsty, tags are per chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-05
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-04-30 04:50:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 12,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5150909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrivingArtist/pseuds/StrivingArtist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of ficlets written on Tumblr as part of the Strife vs Moo Fic Battle, and gathered here, each chapter is around 1000 words.<br/>Chapter Titles are the prompt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Memory Loss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> No Archive Warnings

“And I was saved…. by a halfling? Are you sure you aren’t the one who took a blow to the head old friend?” Thorin asked Balin, one eyebrow doing its best to meet his hairline.  

But, laughing, Balin assured him that the halfling burglar he had hired at Gandalf’s recommendation had indeed tackled an orc and saved his life that night on the cliffside. Thorin wasn’t sure whether that or the rescue by giant eagles sounded more unlikely to him.

Or perhaps he was still unconscious? His head did hurt rather a lot, and the lump was impressive. But to have lost every memory of the last six months? That was ridiculous.

And inconvenient if he was being asked.

He had apparently reclaimed Erebor.

That was too important for him to have no memory of doing so.

He had fought in a battle and the enemy of his line had been slain.

That also seemed too important to have no memory of doing it.

Yet.

Here he sat, ordered to stay in bed a full week. A bed he had awoken in with Oin and a red haired elf above him, bickering about herbs, and unable to recall anything past riding out from Ered Luin to request aid from his kin.

So the Company — and thank Mahal he had met them all before allowing them to sign the contracts — had agreed to come sit with him, and regale him with every detail they could of the quest. It had become obvious to them within minutes that he only believed half of it.

He scowled when they mentioned this Bilbo Baggins, irritated before he could hear more, and doubting every story they told. Surely this was an extended joke.

But as the days passed, and he had nothing to do save listen and sleep, the stories stayed the same. Almost an endless litany of the halfling’s talents and skills and deeds. This halfling that had lamented a lack of handkerchiefs sounded increasingly impressive.

Bofur told him of being just close enough to consciousness while under spider poison to hear Bilbo taunting the beasts, drawing them off, and coming back to save them.

“Really? Spiders the size of ponies? And he fought them?”

Nori told him that Bilbo had assured their escape from the elves.

“But how did he avoid capture for a full month? That’s madness!”

Oin told Thorin that he had carried Bilbo to his room in Laketown when fever sent him into a faint.

“Was he truly that ill?”

Fíli, entirely too proud of the soon-to-be scar on his cheek, told him about Bilbo facing the dragon three times, simply because he had sworn to.

“I sent him to face a dragon alone?”

Kíli, entirely annoyed at his lack of scars, told him testily about what Thorin had done because of the hoard.

“And I still gave him _Mithril_??”

Thorin sat in the dark on the last night of his ordered recuperation, waiting for Dwalin to return and tell him of the battle. In the space of a week he had developed a reluctant admiration for this hobbit he didn’t know. Even as their voices had been filled with friendship and admiration, his companions had still told him the truth of it all. How unsuited the burglar had been. How rude Thorin had been.

But each day the smiles for the burglar grew fonder. Each day his deeds got more impressive, and now Thorin sat waiting to hear what had become of everything in that final battle. That is, he knew they had won. He knew that Azog and Bolg had been slain. But he had realized the day before that his every mention of meeting the hobbit had been neatly deflected, and there was a growing unease in his gut. There was something that his company had been excluding from the retelling; he knew that, but he hadn’t a guess what it could be.

Dwalin certainly pulled no punches as he began his story with the dawn the day of the battle.

Knowing what the hobbit had done for him during the quest, he felt the guilt twice over when told of the threats he shouted. Dwalin couldn’t tell him what happened after Thorin had walked away, only saying that the next time he saw him, Thorin was himself once more.

The dwarves had rallied, the battle had turned. Thorin and his kin had gone to face down the pale orc.

And while his nephews fought Bolg, he had challenged Azog alone. (Dwalin had a few opinions to share on that decision.) He had nearly been killed, and had been saved once again by Bilbo. Bilbo had risked his life bare hours after Thorin had tried to end it.

The thought kept him up all night.

So perhaps he wasn’t thinking clearly when he wandered out of the tent the next morning.

And what few clear thoughts he had evaporated when he saw tawny curls glowing gold in the dawn light. It had to be Bilbo. Surely there was only one hobbit this side of the Misty Mountains.

He rose, looking sad and slightly anxious, “I’m sorry, I suppose I didn’t hear you coming up. You know, Oin hasn’t actually told me if I’m allowed to see you yet. I’ll just, I’ll go then, shall I?”

Thorin took two long steps, awash in something he had no name for. He still didn’t remember, but he had heard the stories, and this hobbit, this wonderful, brilliant, brave, beautiful hobbit, never would look sad again if he had his way.

He said emphatically the only thought in his mind.

“I want to marry you.”

Bilbo’s eyes searched his face for a long moment before an ecstatic smile bloomed. “Oh, Thorin. I’m so glad you still do. Will you put my braid and bead back in?”

“Back?”

“Yes,” He beamed, “Back. And I’ll tell you what the others left out of the story while you do.”


	2. Everyone was Laughing but You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> No Archive Warnings Apply

 

After the funerals it was time to feast and celebrate the victories bought by the fallen. Thorin and his Company had more reason to celebrate than any others.

They all lived.

It had been a near thing, but despite the bandages, they would all live unscathed. So the wine flowed, and they smoked a leaf that their burglar declared the worst pipe weed he’d had in his entire life.

Laughing and cheering, they told stories of the quest, reframing the dangers to something cheerful, and Thorin watched it all with a soft grin. Fíli and Kíli were on their feet, talking about the cliff, talking about Bilbo and Azog. Bilbo, seated beside Thorin, elbowed him in the side when they talked about Thorin’s charge, and shouted protest when Kíli went to his knees to play the part.

For all that he protested, Bilbo was deliriously happy. He had not stopped smiling since the funeral ceremony had ended, and as he went deeper in his cups, it widened. His praises got grander, and he edged a little closer to Thorin’s side.

Tired bodies eventually left them all calmer, and conversation turned to the gold sickness that had taken them all.

“Oh aye, right awful it was,” Bofur muttered, “didn’t care for naught but that gold. Didn’t even notice I didn’t eat for a day or two.”

“I noticed… but I didn’t _mind_.” Bombur added, confused.

They all laughed at that.

“The treasure became the only thing as what mattered.”

“It is quite rare that any dwarf should care about anything but gold when he’s affected.” Balin said sagely.

“So what about that mithril then, uncle?” Kíli teased.

“Aye, what was that about?”

“Something you need to tell us, Thorin?”

“Get a little fond of our hobbit there, Thorin?”

“Never seen ya so nervous about gettin’ someone in their armor!”

“We gonna have a hobbit under the mountain now? Don’t think the consort crown’ll fit him though!”

“What would your father say Thorin?”

The jokes went on, and the laughter of the company grew more boisterous as their comments grew more explicit. Through it all was woven the same joke; that it would never happen.

Next to him, Bilbo chuckled weakly at it, and maybe he started to drink a bit faster.

Thorin didn’t laugh at all.

By the time the barrels were empty and most of the Company had fallen asleep where they sat, it was late into the night.  

Thorin had begun to doze, but startled awake when he felt Bilbo rise and walk away. He found him on a walkway above the treasury, staring at it with revulsion. As he approached, Bilbo undid his belt, pulled off his coat, opened his shirt and tugged the mithril over his head.

“Bilbo?”’

He startled.

“Hello, Thorin. I thought you’d gone to sleep.”

“Not yet.”

He held the shirt gingerly, dragging his coat back over his arms.

“Is it…. uncomfortable? I would have thought you’d barely feel it.” Then Bilbo exhaled hard, and tossed it off the edge, back into the treasure hoard. “Bilbo!”  

“Everyone was laughing but you, Thorin.” He answered as he met Thorin’s eyes. “The others were laughing about how silly it would be for me to stay here. How ridiculous I would be as… as… as what they were joking about. Everyone was laughing. Not you.” There was a question in the accusation, and Thorin had to look away from the earnest concern.

“You did not laugh either Bilbo.” Thorin stepped closer, but didn’t let himself reach out. “Dwarves… we do not… even for those named dwarf-friend, and you will be Bilbo, even for those we never allow….”

“Dwarves keep to their own kind.” Bilbo finished for him. “I’m well aware I was included only because of Gandalf. I know that whatever I may… I know that I will not be allowed to stay.” He cinched his belt once more and nodded toward the treasure, “I had to give it back. What the others said? I don’t want anyone to accuse you of — besides, there really has never been anything between us, I would hate to give the wrong impression.”

The urge was too much and Thorin set a hand on Bilbo’s shoulder. A shoulder. A perfectly decent and friendly locale. So why did his hand scream as if scalded?

“Bilbo, you must understand that had I not been lost as I was, I would never have given you that shirt.” Bilbo turned away, but too slow for Thorin to miss the grimace of agony there. “No. I mean that, greed gave me the courage to do what I wanted, rather than what was expected. Please know that if I could —“

“But you can’t, can you?”

He removed his hand.

“No. I can’t.”

“Perhaps I can travel with Beorn when he leaves tomorrow.”

“No, Bilbo, please no. Don’t. Please, I can’t lose you so soon.”

“Would it ever change? If I stayed?”

He had to be honest. “No. Even as king, I cannot change our ways. You would be resented. You would never be safe here.”

Bilbo’s nose twitched and he swallowed.

“Thought as much.” A hand set against his chest, and a face stripped of mirth watched him. “I suppose we part as _friends_ then. In _friendship_.”

The way his mouth twisted on the word was too much, Thorin bent down and kissed him with every trace of want and impossible hope. Bilbo pressed up into him, just as broken, just as wanting. There was no remedy for this. There was no way the pain would ease, but they could have this memory of a kiss so bittersweet it burned, and they could remember the way they fit together too perfectly to deny, and they could know exactly what they had lost.

They stayed there through the night, wet-cheeked and broken-hearted, kissing as if it didn’t hurt to know that this was all they’d ever have.

When dawn came, Bilbo left with Beorn.


	3. Locked Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gen. But Bilbo/Thorin if you want it to be  
> No Archive Warnings Apply  
> But there is implied future major character death.

 

The Company of Thorin Oakenshield sat on the doorstep of the secret passage into Erebor, awaiting the return of their hobbit burglar. With luck, he would appear in a moment’s time with a the Arkenstone and news that the Worm was dead.

Dwarves were rarely gifted with an abundance of luck.

Thorin sat beside his nephews, counting the time as it passed, and worrying with each moment that slipped by that something had gone wrong. It was a sensation that was familiar for him. He had decades of experience waiting and hoping that the outcome would not be so bad as his imaginings. At Balin and Dwalin’s behest he had exited the corridor he had been standing in. The memory of a lost home was wonderful, but they did not want the future King to place himself in location when a burst of dragon fire could take his life.

So he sat beside his nephews.

And together, they waited.

Time stretched on, and the tension rose. Night was upon them. Darkness was upon them. The moon had continued its nightly migration. Not a member of the company was able to think of something beyond the fate of their too-loyal companion, deep within the mountain and quite possibly facing off against a dragon.

Thorin’s heart jumped when he heard the scrape of stone. He leapt to his feet and stared down the passage, and it took him too long to realize what was happening.

Beside him Bofur shouted in alarm. Dwalin jumped forward.

Thorin turned, and saw the door to the secret passage moving, sliding itself back closed.

No doubt a protection added to it to keep the mountain safe.

They flung their weight against it, they blocked its path with boulders, they braced it open with weaponry, but in the end there was nothing that could stop the door from closing itself. Dwalin pulled Thorin and Kíli back as they tried to slip inside before it did, desperate to reach Bilbo and help him find a new way out of the Mountain.

A rush of wind blew past them as it did, dry and dusty, and a horrified silence held them in its thrall.

“No, no, the key, where? Where did it?” Bofur was muttering, looking over the ground with a rising panic. Some of the others joined in, looking for the key to reopen the door.

Some others, Thorin among them, did not bother.

He was staring, pained at the smooth stretch of stone that covered the place where the keyhole had been. The key, useless for another year or more dangled on its leather thong from his fingers.

Then the earth shook beneath them with a rumble that Thorin knew could only have come from Smaug.

Something broken ripped out of Thorin’s chest with a fractured sound; half terror of the beast, half guilt.

A second roll of thunder sounded from deep in the mountain.

“He must know where the door is.” Balin said as the rumbling faded. “We have to move.”

“Bilbo—“

“Thorin, the door is sealed, there is no way to open it again. We have to move.”

The others already were. Even as tears rose in their eyes, they were gathering what packs and weapons they had carried to begin to climb down. They had to hide, and hope that the dragon did not find them.

Thorin was the last one standing on the ledge, promises to follow in a moment turning stale on his tongue. He thought there could not be a worse pain than the clenching of his heart as he tried to convince himself to walk away.

Then he heard something more. A whisper of sound, and barely even that. Then a soft clink of stone against stone. Three taps and a pause. Three taps and a pause.

“No. No! Bilbo!?” Thorin slammed his hand against the closed door.

“Thorin?” It was muffled, but he could hear him. His voice was exhausted, out of breath, and in pain.

“Bilbo! We tried! Forgive us! We tried. You have to find another way out!” He did not care that he was yelling, that his voice might bring down the dragon.

“I can’t! He’s guarding the door. I know he is.”

“You have to try! Smaug will come out to hunt, survive til then and make for the front gate! Bilbo you have to try! Bilbo promise me!”

It was silent for a long moment.

“Thorin?”

“Yes?” His voice cracked as he answered, the open honest voice on the other side of the stone had been resigned.

“I— Thorin? I found it. I have the Arkenstone. It’s right here, Thorin.”

“No! Bilbo!”

Balin had come back with Fíli, and could see what had happened in the slump of Thorin’s spine, and the way he rested his forehead against the stone.

“Thorin? Are you still there?” Any of them could hear the tears in his voice.

“I’m here.”

“When—Thorin, next year— the door opens again next year, it will be here for you. The Arkenstone will be here. I’ll leave it right here. You won’t need another burglar.”

The ground shook again as the dragon raged.

Balin stepped closer.

“Bilbo, no! Go to the gate! Try to reach the gate!” Thorin screamed as his friend and kin locked arms around him to drag him away. 


	4. When I Confronted him…

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dwalin/Nori  
> No Major Archive Warnings  
> Soulmate AU

 

“Stop flinching, targith, you want this cleaned out don’t you?”

Dwalin glared at Thorin as his friend wiped more of the blood and dirt out of the cut on his arm. But since he couldn’t reach it himself, he was just going to have to let Thorin be a prick about it.

“You were explaining.”

“Aye.”

“You had finally found our thief?”

“Aye.”

“And?”

Dwalin grumbled. This thief had been a problem for them for years. Whoever it was probably was the same thief that sent various nobles and shopkeepers to the guards each month, but a few years back, Thorin and his heir had woken up with their beads missing. All of their beads. Kili had been blamed of course. Until all of the beads had reappeared -- on their braids -- while Kili was sitting on night watch as punishment.

It had only gotten worse from there. One morning the furniture had been rearranged. One day Thorin left his office for lunch and came back to find most of the valuables gone and a charity chit left on the center of the desk.

Two nights later they all came back.

Dwalin had to figure it was the thief taunting them.

No matter how many guards he set, no matter how he tightened security for the line of Durin, their mystery thief managed to find a way.

Then they had finally gotten a tip, and Dwalin hadn’t bothered to send a guard. He went himself. He was determined. This thieving dangerous dwarf was going to be thrown from the gates and banished….. after he explained how he’d done it all.

So it was pretty shameful that when Dwalin had managed to chase him down, it hadn’t gone to plan.

“Aye, he was in an alley, and unless he could just scale the wall he wasn’t going to get away again.”

“But he did.”

“I’ve never liked you.”

“I am aware.”

“When I confronted him….”

“Yes?”

Dwalin mumbled the answer.

“What was that?”

More mumbling.

“Did you just say you got distracted?”

“A bit.”

“Why? How? Dwalin, you have been trying to find this dwarf for years, and you found yourself distracted just as you reached him?” Thorin was laughing, having long since declared that the thief clearly meant them no harm, and that while he was interested to see who it was, he was not obsessed with it like the head of his guard.

So Dwalin chewed on his lip for a moment as Thorin dropped the rags into a hamper. He turned back with a flask in hand. Looking mirthful and smug.

Couldn’t have that.

“Anyone bother to tell you that you were wearing one blue glove and one green today?”

“Yes, Dís mentioned that fact to me earl----” Then he cut off and gaped.

“Yeah.”

“No.”

“Yep.”

“ _No_.”

“Uh huh.”

“You were distracted because--”

“Yeah.”

“You’re colorstruck.”

“Yes.”

Thorin leaned against the desk and took a large drink. He passed it over and waited.

“Well. This changes things.”

“Hardly.”

“Of course it does. I’m going to have to pardon him aren’t I?”

“No! He’s still a thief!”

“He’s also your One.”

“Don’t remind me…” Dwalin groaned, leaning his head into his hands.

“So what happened to your arm?”

Dwalin didn’t really want to answer that. However, Thorin had that look. “Tripped when I chased after him.”

“Well I’m far more interested in finding this dwarf now. Do you remember anything about what he looked like, or were you too dazed from being struck?” The taunting voice really wasn’t necessary.

The knock of the door saved him having to answer. Thank Mahal. Some noble or other was throwing a hissy fit and it needed Thorin’s attention.

Which allowed Dwalin to escape without further mocking.

There were worse things in the world than having your One be a thief. They could be an orc. Or an Elf. But Dwalin was going to grumble and whine about it anyway.

He stoked the fire in his rooms back up and eased into a comfortable chair.

One thing was still bothering him though.

“Why wasn’t he as flummoxed as I was?” He muttered.

“Because I got a few years back.”

Dwalin flung sideways, and stared at the dwarf lounging against the door into his bedchamber. Yep. Yep. That was him alright. Ridiculous hair, smirking sideways, braids every which way. The most troublesome thief the city had ever seen.

And dammit all if Dwalin didn’t want to kiss him.

“A few years back?”

He got a pitying look in return.

“What did you think all this flirting’s been about? I’m not normally in the habit of givin’ back the things I nick, you know.”

“Flirting?”

“Flirting.”

Dwalin floundered a minute, hoping it would all make sense soon, realizing distantly that Thorin was going to give him hell for it when he learned. Then bag of coin hit him in the chest.

“Thought you might want that back.” the thief said with a wink. “Your beads are in there too. Well. All but one of em.”

And the dwarf fiddled with a braid behind his ear.

Yep, Dwalin had found his thief all right. Dammit. 


	5. Erase

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gen but Bilbo/Thorin if you want it  
>  Major Character Death  
>  Present tense
> 
> This one owes its life to
> 
> Paranoid Fridge's ["Buried Alive"](http://archiveofourown.org/works/759613/chapters/1420933)

 

“Then I will leave the throne to Fili.”

“That’s not how it would work, laddie.”

“Then it will pass to Dain!”

“Thorin.”

He shifts the sleeve, trying to make the edge smooth and graceful. Wishes it was clean, fitted, stitched and detailed properly. It isn’t. Balin speaks again and Thorin can do nothing more than nod.

“None of us like it, Uncle.” Kili says from behind him. They’re all there of course. The whole of the company is crowded into the small chamber, out of the way of traffic and unknown by any but themselves. It is damning that even Kili has acquiesced to this. Even his headstrong nephew, set on doing the right thing against all risk, believes this to be the right course.

“And cousin Dain is a good dwarf,” Fili adds, “but his generals and his court aren’t. They’re the ones that would have power. They’re who would rule the mountain. Uncle, we need to do this, to keep the mountain. It’s the only thing you talked about since the two of us were running at your knee. We have to do this. It’s the only thing you wanted.”

Not any more.

That’s the crux of it. That’s the point that has tripped him on what, a year ago, would have been an easy choice.

He tucks the strand of hair behind an ear and wishes they could bring soap and water. He always hated being dirty. They can’t of course. It would be noticed. Balin saw the likely outcome and began to take steps while the dying still lay on the field. It has been barely four days since the battle, and the injured of all three races are tucked into Erebor, convalescing away from the rising winter winds. There are faces everywhere. They is a constant stream of murmurs and whispers that must be quashed.

Nori and Ori have begun the work already, crafting story and rumor and spreading them like wildfire. The Broadbeams have taken each meal with a new set of Dain’s men, telling loud and exuberant stories of Thorin Oakenshield: the dwarf prince who took fate in his hands and reclaimed Erebor, too brave and noble to fall to the same weakness of his grandfather.

It’s working.

That might be the worst of it. It is working.

Ori has a gift for finding the story that the masses will respond to, and his brother has the talent to see it spread.

Even in the last two days, ever since they began their efforts in full, the feeling in the mountain has shifted. Rumors of madness are being replaced one after the next with awed whispers.

It will not hold.

They are winning the soldiers, but the generals remain unsure, and they are a far more dangerous battle. A false move, a mistake, a single scrap of this truth could undo it all.

Thorin would be cast out alongside his kin.

He would make the trade glady.

Except Fili is right.

“Erebor must stay in the direct line.” He accedes. Never mind the way his chest tightens down and his heart pounds against the betrayal sitting on his tongue like ash. The collar of the coat is stained crimson, but he cannot do anything to fix it.

“It’s what he wanted for ya. If he could, he’d be saying the same as all of us. Ya know that. Little thing seemed to put us ahead of himself ever since....” Dwalin trails into silence, not able to complete the thought since it would only further prove their betrayal.

“Ever since he saved me from Azog.” Thorin finishes. “The first time.” Caked with blood as it is, the hair is too unruly to look neat. Thorin tries to control it anyway. If this must happen, and it must, at least he can ensure one thing. “Ori, I want a second chronicle written, a truthful one, one where Bi--”

“We can’t. Thorin. We can’t. Ever.” Ori interrupts, sympathetic but without any give, “You want me to write a second telling a story that could overthrow your line and your rule in a day. It can never be written. I will not endanger you like that. It has to be erased. All of it. His name will be struck from the chronicle. My notes from the journey will be destroyed. We must erase him entirely. When asked, the only answer can be that he betrayed you. Traitors are not exalted or remembered no matter what they did before.”

“He wasn’t a--”

“He is now.” Ori’s voice is unmovable.

“Then we should at least see him returne--”

“Thorin. You ought to leave this to us.” Nori says, “There’s things we’ve gotta do. Don’t go hurtin’ yourself more. If we’re gonna make this story stick, can’t leave any holes.”

Thorin’s hand clutches at the smaller, softer, icy one on the bed, desperate to guard him from this.

If he was alive, this wouldn’t be a question. None of them would have even suggested it. None would consider letting the world think their friend a traitor and unwanted if he was alive.

He isn’t.

Bilbo is dead. He lies on a cot in a forgotten corner of Erebor where he died unattended, before Thorin could beg forgiveness, his chest shattered by the blow of a mace meant for Thorin. He no longer wears the mithril that failed to save his life, and lays there in the ruined clothes he was given in Laketown. Even in death his face shows the pain of his end.

The Company must call him a traitor, spit upon his name, be the most vocal of his detractors, and convince the rest that it is true. Anything less will hand the crown to the vipers in the Ironfoot clan.

All at once it is too much, and Thorin stands and flees. Balin finds him against a wall, holding back tears that he could not explain if they were seen. “You’ll tell me where? I would like to be able to visit where he is buried.”

Balin says nothing, and the truth crushes slowly into Thorin’s heart.

He nods jerkily.

“With the orcs?” He knows the answer and asks, wanting to be told he is wrong.

“The pits are still burning.”

Thorin chokes when he tries to answer.

“I’m sorry lad.” Balin sees the way Thorin starts to cave, falling into despair and every chance of madness, and cuts through it, “Your Majesty.”

Because that is why they are about to so wrong their lucky number. He slides a hand into his pocket and clutches the acorn there as he walks towards his chambers. With each bow and obeisance, he builds a wall against the pain, made of the phrase ‘your majesty’ and inside it, he promises himself he will remember Bilbo, even as the others erase him. 


	6. Wind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gen or low key Kili/Fili if you want to read it like that  
> Background Bilbo/Thorin  
> No Archive Warnings Apply  
> Fix it

 

“I hate you, nadad.”

“I know, nadadith.”

“How much farther to the inn?”

“Another mile or so.”

“Buggering breeze.”

“Awww, Kíli, you know you wouldn’t have this trouble if you just wore it in braids.”

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it is.”

“Fíli?”

“Aye?”

“I hate you.”

* * *

 

It was fortunate that Kíli had the coloring of a Durin about him, because he had clearly inherited little else. He used a bow first off-- quite well, but it still wasn’t fitting to the line of Durin. He was rather thin and waifish, not carved broad and strong like his brother. He didn’t actually hate the elves, which many considered to be his greatest failing as a Durin.

They were wrong.

The rest were minor niggles in his life, gnats buzzing around him.

There was one thing that truly made him feel like he wasn’t a Durin.

* * *

 

“How does he even do it?”

“I really don’t know, Bilbo.”

“But it’s just constant!”

“I know.”

“And your brother too! Just look at them!”

“Yes.”

“And the pair of us look like birds nests.”

“No need to remind me.”

* * *

 

Something about being related to Durin the Deathless had imbued the line with a gift that surmounted all others.

No matter the weather, no matter how the wind howled or the rain fell. No matter if they had just fought a battle or just stepped from the bath. No matter if someone who shall remain nameless had pressed burrs into their brother’s hair during the night. No matter what, a dwarf of the line of Durin, always looked majestic.

Except it seemed to have skipped Kíli.

* * *

 

“I look like a drowned rat!”

“Aye laddie you do.”

“And look at the pair of them! Oh, not at Uncle and Bilbo.”

“No, no one needs to see that lad.”

“But just look at Fi! I’ve never looked that regal in my life!”

“You haven’t.”

“That’s not very nice, Mister Dwalin.”

* * *

 

Some of it was related to confidence. Kíli was aware of this. Half of the reason his damned majestic uncle and his damned gorgeous brother looked like they did as they climbed out of a toilet was just that they believed they would look good.  His own efforts to be that confident were less successful.

Cocksure was not the same thing as confident.

So Kíli climbed up through a toilet on the Long Lake looking more suited to be going down said toilet. Not that being wounded helped.

* * *

 

“You look like crap brother.”

“Orc poison.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to hear it Fíli. I was shot.”

“Yes.”

“And I was poisoned.”

“You still look like crap.”

* * *

 

He had kinda hoped that being back in Erebor, draped in gold, wealthy, healthy and happy, would serve to make him look as good as Fíli did every bloody day.

Once he was there though, he was a bit preoccupied with the siege force, and the fact that his uncle was working in the forge, but the coals were out.

There was a brief moment when he almost felt like he might have managed to get the light to hit his face just right as his hair floated in the breeze, but then Thranduil fired on Dain and he was distracted by the arrow breakers -- which were just as amazing as he’d ever hoped.

*****

“You search the lower levels. I’ve got this.”

“Like amad’d forgive me if we split up.”

“That’s… a good point.”

“What?”

“You just looked--”

“Insult me later Fí, we have orcs to hunt.”

* * *

 

For once, listening to his brother would have been a terrible idea, not that Fíli was going to admit that. But as the brothers fought their way free of the orcs lying in wait, back onto the ice and snow, retreating to where Thorin and Dwalin could assist, Kíli knew he’d made the right call.

Stupid suggestion aside, his brother fought like a whirlwind, twin blades flashing as they hacked through anything that tried to touch them. Black blood splashed, and left a spatter over both of them. As Kíli knocked back another orc he saw his brother and spared the time to sigh.

It just wasn’t fair.

Covered in ichor, and Fíli still looked like that.

He’d have continued to admire (and pout) but another orc was sneaking up, and as annoying as Fíli’s eternal Durin Majesticness was, Kíli wanted to keep him around.

* * *

 

“Heard ya fought well!”

“Suppose so.”

“None of ya died, ya fought well!”

“Thanks, Dain.”

“Och, I know that look.”

“I don’t have a look!”

“Ya do. You’ll work it out one day. I didn’t til I was near a hundred.”

“That’s not encouraging Dain.”

* * *

 

Thranduil was a prick. A lounging, canting, insulting, imperious, wine sodden prick.

This was news to no one.

Not even to the two elves Kíli was sitting next to who overheard his muttering. They supplied more adjectives to his growing list. Obstreperous was the best.

Then the blonde noticed Kíli was also a few steps past jealous about the elf looking so damnably majestic, and started to whisper on a different subject. By the time he was done, Kíli was eagerly looking forward to the next windy day.

* * *

 

“Ki….Kíli?”

“Yes nadad?”

“Where did you….”

Kíli tilted his head on just the right angle as he looked at his brother, let the amber light of the setting sun blush over his cheeks as the faint breeze luffed through his hair. It was all about the wind according to the elves. Finding it, gracefully turning with it when necessary, and shamelessly hiding altogether when the look wasn’t quite right.

Kíli had been practicing.

Based on Fíli’s open mouth, it had worked.

“Something wrong Fíli?”

“Not at all nadad. Welcome to the club.”

 

 


	7. Promise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> Fix it  
> So sweet it'll give you cavities

“You promise you’ll keep your eyes closed?”

Bilbo narrowed his eyes and leaned away from his eager husband. In the last year and a half of knowing him that particular giddy look -- too similar to Kili’s face before something awful happened -- had become the harbinger of many many things that Bilbo withheld cookies over later.

“Why? What do you have planned, Thorin?”

He just smiled wider, practically beaming, and actually bounced ever so slightly in his shoes.

Whatever it was, there was no way Bilbo was going to be able to deny him when he looked like this. He was as eager as any puppy with a toy, or a faunt watching the pies in the oven. Bilbo couldn’t crush that.

“I promise I’ll keep them closed, you silly thing.”

So he closed his eyes with a weary sigh that was more affectation than exasperation.

He could feel Thorin closing the distance to kiss him a moment later. There was far too much hair and beard and fur and beads for Thorin to ever truly surprise him. Not that Bilbo objected to the sweetly tender kiss. It still tasted of Thorin’s tea from lunch.

His eyes fluttered back open as the kiss ended, “You wanted me to close my eyes so you could kiss me?”

“Not only for that. Though you have made it clear I cannot trust you to keep your eyes shut, so I suppose it will have to be a blindfold after all.”

Bilbo’s protests were summarily ignored, as they often were when Thorin was this excited about something. And it wasn’t as if this was the first time Thorin had blindfolded him, though was not normally in the middle of the day. Assuming he wasn’t going to be led to a bedchamber for more intimate pursuits, he let Thorin set hands on his shoulders and guide him as they walked.

They were still in the royal suite, of that he was sure.

It wasn’t as if Bilbo had managed to explore every corner of it, since every time he thought he had, one of the dwarves would appear from behind a door he hadn’t even known existed.

Whatever it was, Thorin was excited enough to have tightened his grip on Bilbo’s arms. Servants or someone was opening doors for them, and his husband whispered in his ear when the floor stepped up or down.

Really, it wouldn’t have been altogether a shock if Thorin had just scooped him up and carried him wherever they were going. It would have gotten Thorin pinched in the side, not that it had ever been much a deterrent. Thorin still worried over Bilbo’s limp and his scars at every reminder that they existed.

But eventually they were, well, wherever it was Thorin wanted them to be.

He reached up for the fabric over his eyes, intending to pull it free and look around. Strong hands caught his and prevented it.

“Bilbo,” The voice in his ear was almost quavering, but the arms wrapped around him were solid. They held him against a broad warm chest that rumbled with the voice coming from it. A soft kiss was pressed to his neck and Thorin continued, “I know that you wish you could have travelled west this spring, and I am aware it was only due to your injuries last year,” another kiss, more reverent, graced over the point of his ear, “that you agreed to remain here until next spring when you would be able to travel again. But I have found that I would much prefer not to be parted from you at all.”

“Why am I wearing a blindfold Thorin? Are you blushing again? Did you not want me to see that?” He squirmed a bit, without any hope of actually freeing his arms. “And why did we have to walk all the way over to… well… here?”

Patience had never been one of his particular virtues.

“It will make sense to you soon, sanze.” He moved to stand in front of Bilbo, and pressed their foreheads together with an exhale of utter contentment. Thorin pecked him on the nose, and Bilbo could feel him smiling again, that wide exultant youthful burst of sunlight in his normally grumpy husband. Fingers brushed over his cheeks and under the cloth.

Just to be difficult, he kept his eyes closed as it was removed. At Thorin’s amused huff he quirked an eyebrow and quipped, “I did promise to keep them closed.”

“And I promised to give you a home.”

Bilbo’s eyes opened at that, staring up bewildered for a moment as Thorin’s eyes sparkled in anticipation.

Then he caught sight of what was behind his husband, and his jaw slowly fell on a breathed, “Oh goodness.”

He was standing in Bag End. That is, he wasn’t, that was impossible of course, but he may as well have been.

Every piece of furniture he had worried about left in the care of his cousins was safe and sound and arranged in an almost perfect match to the layout under the hill. His armchair, his books, a tired old quilt his mother had favored, everything.

Bilbo tried to look away and thank Thorin, but kept looking back at each newly noticed item. So every time he turned back to his husband his smile had grown. Even the walls had been redone in glowing oak paneling. The doors weren’t round, and there was only the one window, but it was beyond anything he had ever expected.

“How?” He managed to ask eventually.

“I’ve found there are very few things that cannot be solved with the exertion of Erebor’s treasury.”

“No I meant--”

“I promised you would have a home here, as meaningful for you as Erebor is to me. I would never have separated you from the treasures of your family.”

He nearly climbed his husband as he kissed him, and as Thorin held his weight he began to murmur thanks and praise against his lips. Thorin grinned and shook his head.

“No, no. Nothing I do will ever be enough to thank you, after everyth---”

Bilbo shut him up again with a deeper kiss. Thorin might consider himself eternally in Bilbo’s debt over that whole nephew-saving, enemy-slaying business, but as far as the hobbit was concerned, he was now in Thorin’s debt.

Thorin was finally acquiescing to Bilbo’s kiss-based repayment plan when a thought occurred.

Like a shot, he was out of his husband’s arms and rifling through drawers and crates and bins.

“Something wrong?” Thorin asked warily.

“We’ll get back to that in a moment! I need to find them first!”

“Find what?”

Bilbo spun with twin armfuls of kitchen implements, shocked, “My spoons of course!”

 

 


	8. Wait til Tomorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> No archive warnings apply  
> Not fluff.  
> Stylized writing

 

 

I’m sorry. I hate you. I love you. Come back. Stay away. I’m dying. I miss you. I’ll never forgive you. Please forgive me.

It doesn’t matter which it is. It doesn’t matter which words he would find there.

Bilbo cannot open the letter.

It sits on his desk, right next to his appointment book and it reminds him every time he walks past his study that he has not opened it. It isn’t as if it would be difficult to open.

It’s impossible to open.

Paper and wax and a fine green ribbon. Blue wax. Green Ribbon. White parchment.

It’s slowly turning yellow now.

It’s impossible to open.

He is a perfectly proper hobbit. He goes to tea, he goes to market. He knows the names of all his cousins. He knows the names of all their children. He knows the best recipe for sugared violets. He always eats his seven meals a day, and he never causes any trouble.

It was just the once he travelled. And nothing good came of that.

Just once.

Twice.

Two times.

Two mistakes. Once to leave home. Once to come back.

But now he is. He’s back and he can’t change that fact. So he goes to tea and he goes to market and he smiles at his neighbors as they pass his garden.

It is a very nice garden. It is a very nice house.

It’s a terrible home.

He goes to bed at night on a promise to open it tomorrow. Tomorrow will be brighter, tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow will be the day when looks at a blue seal and a green ribbon and he will remember how to open it.

He’ll remember how to be brave.

He forgot somehow.

Somedays he wakes up and thinks he will. He promises at night and breaks it in the morning, but sometimes he thinks he might.

But he feels fingers on his throat. He feels stone against his back. He feels wind against his face and a painful wrenching in his chest.

He doesn’t ever open the letter.

The raven was exquisite.

Tall and strong and young. It had to be. It crossed the mountains. It came to find him. It carried the letter all the way.

Bilbo didn’t speak to it.

He took the letter and he nodded and he thought he wasn’t strong enough. Not today.

Maybe tomorrow he would open it. That was what he thought.

Maybe tomorrow he would be strong. Maybe tomorrow he would dare.

But it was never tomorrow. It was always today.

He serves the best tea. Everyone in the four farthings knows it. He learned about it from one of them. But the hobbits don’t need to know that. They just think he’s very good at it.

He’s very good at many things.

But he can’t open the letter. That’s impossible.

He knows the writing. He looks at it sometimes. Stares. Wonders. Never touches. Thinks how easy it would be to pull the ribbon and crack the wax and open the letter.

It’s impossible to open.

Because he has hands on his throat and wind in his hair.

He lived. They lived. They all lived. They saw the sun set on that horrible day, all still breathing.

They stayed.

He didn’t.

He ran.

There were voices behind him as he did, but he didn’t stop. Couldn’t stop.

The voices cried and begged. He knew those voices. He loved them.

One more than the others.

They called his name and he ran away because he had forgotten how to be brave.

A hobbit didn’t have to be brave in the Shire.

Only brave enough for an extra cake. He was brave enough for that.

Not for this. Not for a letter full of words he was too scared to read. Not for a letter that held his heart inside it. Not for a letter that would tell him what he had ruined. What he was missing. If he was missed.

Because he can feel the pain in his chest each day when he passes the study.

Because he knows that the words in there won’t change. If he opens it. If he reads. Then he knows. He’ll always know. The words will be real and the chance will be over.

Tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow will be brighter. He can open it then.

It’s impossible to open.

He thought they might come looking. He thought that they might wonder. He thought that they might come.

They didn’t. They don’t. They never have.

They don’t mind him being gone.

It says to stay away. He knows it says that but he doesn’t want to see those words.

The letter sits on his desk and turns yellow.

They would have come.

If it didn’t. If it said come back. If it said I miss you. If it said I’m sorry.

They would have come.

He would have come.

They crossed the world and fought a dragon.

If he missed Bilbo he would have come.

He never gives up.

If he wanted Bilbo he would have tried.

He never forgets.

If he loved Bilbo he wouldn’t have let him go.

He never forgives.

And he never will.

The years have passed by and no one comes. Bilbo knows what’s in the letter.

He never reads it but he knows.

If he reads it then it can never change.

So he never reads it.

He eats his meals and goes to market and smiles at his neighbors. He pours his tea and smokes his pipe and tends his garden. He is a perfectly proper hobbit.

He goes to bed at night and promises that tomorrow he’ll be stronger. That tomorrow will be better.

Tomorrow will be brighter.

He will open it tomorrow.

He never does.

 

 

 


	9. Runes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bagginshield  
> References to Graphic Violence  
> References to Torture

 

Thorin has always been fond of the angtheras. There were sigils and glyphs built from the runes of khuzdul that were used everyday. They were stamped into finished pieces and placed as signatures on documents within the mountain.

He had always loved the sharp edges of them. The way the lines converged. It seems so much more useful than the looping curves of tengwar. Khuzdul was a language that kept itself secret by its very nature, teaching it to someone was simple enough, but teaching someone to read the glyphs was another matter altogether. It was a question of experience to read and see the meaning in a flash, rather than trying to parse out which curve and line was allotted to each rune.

Thorin supposed it was not too different from the way that Bilbo could glance at a plant and know just what it was and what it needed to be just a bit healthier.

Glyphs were everywhere in the mountain, and as consort, Bilbo certainly saw them often enough. He was a quick study and had a sharp eye. He learned the most common ones quickly.

Glyphs for professions and titles. Glyphs for the mastery beads that many wore in their braids. Glyphs that were little better than gossip.

There were others that were more complex. They did not follow standard shapes, or they were from a word that Thorin had taken care Bilbo did not learn.

It was a failing of his, trying to protect Bilbo from the vicious whirl of rumor in the mountain.

It was a battle that the company fought each day, and if the consort questioned new bruises or bandages, he was redirected with lighthearted comments on the rowdiness of dwarves.

Bilbo had believed them.

Of course he had.

They had never lied to him before, and he had no cause to think that they would begin now, when the mountain was reclaimed and they were at peace.

Except, they weren’t at peace.

Thorin just had not wanted Bilbo to know.

There had been a new glyph spotted in the mountain. First just in the back alleys and darkest corners of taverns. Then along stairways leading to the craftworkers level.

Then Thorin found it etched into the wood of the door to Bilbo’s garden.

Thorin had always been fond of the angtheras.

He admired the simplicity and the beauty of it.

He did not think he would be able to read khuzdul again without remembering this.

Thorin had puzzled at it when he first saw it. The peaks of the runes turned sideways and overlapping, and the single larger glyph writ beneath were not common usage, and admiration was not enough for him to read it with ease.

Nori knew it at a glance.

Dwalin turned pale.

{Crime of Purity}

Carved into his consort’s door.

But they did not tell Bilbo.

Most of the mountain adored him. His insistence on keeping everyone fed should have been more than enough to win them over, but his hobbit manners meant that none but the company saw his temper crackling on the edges. They should have adored him.

Six years after the reclamation of the mountain, Bilbo’s largest complaint had been that without windows he never knew the time.

One of the most clever dwarves in the mountain had brought him a small timepiece he could carry in his pocket a few weeks after Bilbo had complained in public.

Thorin had been sure that the Mountain loved him as he and the Company did.

Thorin tried to calm the guilt over how wrong he had been.

Oin had told him that there was no fear of losing him. That Bilbo was strong and resilient, he said. That in a day or so he would wake, and he would heal, and Thorin could hear for himself that Bilbo would not be cowed by something so small.

It was not small.

Bilbo was strong, but this would be too much.

Those who carved the rune on door, on the table were not solitary discontented dwarves. Those who painted it on the wall of their shared bed chamber were not operating alone.

Those who had taken Bilbo were not single agents.

Those who had kept him hidden for a week as Dwalin loudly, and Nori subtly, tore the mountain apart, were not something he could pretend did not exist anymore.

Those who had carved a glyph into Bilbo’s chest were why Thorin was folding Bilbo’s favorite jackets, and tucking them into a travel case.

It did not matter that those responsible had been found. Their gruesome execution would not change that there were others. Nothing could change that the Mountain he had helped them to take was no longer safe for him.

He stared a moment at the tunic in his hands. It had been made for a midwinter feast two years earlier. It had been a surprise for Thorin. But the runes embroidered around the edge no longer made him smile, proud of how his hobbit had embraced his life in Erebor.

All he could seen now was his husband’s body as Oin and the healers cleaned the dirt and tar from his skin, revealing more injuries with each pass of the cloth. He saw the stray tufts of hair that were all that was left of the curls Thorin had braided so reverently. He saw the contusions from repeated beatings. He saw the weeping burns in the shape of the circlet Thorin had crafted with his own hands upon his forehead.

Bilbo could not stay.

Even if he woke and wanted to remain, Thorin would not allow it.

Done by a minority or not, there was an accusation carved into Bilbo’s skin now. Stories would spread too fast to be stopped. His hair was shorn, his braids were gone. The beads missing.

He could not undo what had been done to his hobbit. He could not change the things he had survived. But he could remove him to a safer place.

The Shire. Naturally the Shire.

Thorin froze as he looked at the runes on the next tunic. Mahal’s blessing was wrapped around the collar. The runes he had always loved turned his stomach, just seeing them pulled at his gut and brought him back to the image of his One in a fetid cell, too far gone with pain and injury to hear Thorin calling.

He had begun this task without thinking. Without considering that sending Bilbo to safety would mean sending him away from Thorin.

Icy pain rushed down his arms at the thought of seeing Bilbo leave without a promise to return.

Yet this was his home.

These were his people and he was their king.

But Bilbo was his One.

This was his birthright.

It would fling the mountain into chaos.

It would dishonor his deeds, and he would be brought to judgement when he passed into the halls of his Maker.

He did not care.

Bilbo lay on the bed, bundled into bandages, near death, still sleeping under the power of Oin’s brews.

Thorin emptied the case and began packing again, layering together two sets of clothing, one larger than the other, and he took care not to choose a single piece that bore a rune.

 


	10. Thread

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> Soulmate AU  
> Major Character Death

 

The Arkenstone in the breast of his coat is a weight he would rather not carry. The crown that the people of Laketown have all but set upon his head is a second, and though it is not there yet, he can feel himself crushed beneath it already.

But this must be done.

The dwarf-king is unreasonable.

They are starving.

Bard would have no faith in him except for the promise from his soulmate.

Bilbo Baggins had stood in front of them the night before, and sworn that this would serve. He had sworn on his honor that Thorin would honor the exchange. If the hobbit’s eyes had flicked down to his chest as he said it, they hadn’t been the only ones.

***

Bard first sees the pair as they stand on the banks of the river, sodden and suspicious. The dwarf and the hobbit are an unusual pair, but there is no denying the vibrant rope tying them together, unseen, but so enormously strong that Bard is confident how it would look.

An acknowledged bond then.

The pair has seen it, accepted it, and cared for it. It’s a rare thing, and it is that more than the promises the hobbit speaks that sway the people of the town that night.

It’s not common to see a bond like that.

It’s hard not to want to help it to thrive.

Everyone always thinks that they will find their own some day.

***

Bard wants to nod to Bilbo when he sees him behind the other dwarves. Terrible idea though. Thorin is still a pillar of infuriated offense. He’s dressed in furs and gold while Bard’s people shiver in the husk of a broken town.

So he continues with the speech they had agreed upon.

He explains, and he draws the Arkenstone into the light, and even he can see the beauty of the thing. On the stone wall above him, Thorin gapes, and doubts.

***

That rope he had seen on the river, glittering with strength, swirled through with the blue of deep mountain lakes and the gold of a summer sun, that rope had been unshakeable.

Unbreakable.

The soul mates that had left Laketown to face a dragon had anticipated each other and moved around each other as if they shared a mind.

The hobbit that stands before him in Thranduil’s tent is unbowed, but any of them can feel how withered the bond has become in the past weeks. It’s a string. Solid, but no longer something to inspire songs and great deeds.

It’s present, but the change in it is painful, even from outside. Bard rubs a hand against his chest, knowing that the joy of an awakened bond is just one side of the coin. On the other is the agony of its loss. There is written the hollowness of a part of your soul torn out, shattered and destroyed, irreparably lost.

But no one in living memory knows of a bond that broke before death.

The pain of a soulmate’s death is enough to bring most to their knees.  That pain is said to be a pale shadow beside a bond that is destroyed before then.

Bard remembers the ache too well.

But no one who has found their soul mate would ever allow the bond to fail. It does not happen.

***

Bilbo Baggins steps forward, challenges the gold-mad king, promises that it was done to help them all. To save lives. Maybe the archers behind him cannot see, but Bard has all too clear a view as the bond thrums with love and hope while Bilbo speaks.

Something is Bard’s chest lightens as the hobbit stands tall and the bond glows brighter.

***

Those who have met their bond are more attuned to feel the flow along someone else’s. Those that have acknowledged the bond feel it even more so. Bard would wish it were not true. If he was not able to see so clearly, it would be less a torture to watch it happen.

***

The glow of the rope between them, already shriveled and eroded to a string, is flickering. For a horrid moment Bard is ready to give back the stone for nothing, just to spare the pair from what he can see approaching them without mercy, bearing down on them with ruin and despair.

He isn’t fast enough to speak.

Thorin grabs Bilbo and hauls him onto the barricading wall of the ramparts. With the dwarf’s hands about the hobbit’s throat, the line drawn between their chests is almost perfectly vertical. It is perfectly defined against the dark of the dwarf’s attire.

It shivers, and even at a distance, Bard can feel it shrink yet more.

Thorin’s raging words batter at it, tearing it to pieces as he yells and threatens. It’s no more than a thread, finer than a hair, almost invisible. The hot strikes of anger have nearly destroyed it, but so long as Bilbo can hold on, surely, surely the dwarf will feel the rending and return to himself.

This isn’t the dwarf that he met, and no one, _no one_ , would be able to withstand the torture that must even now claw at their hearts.

He does not.

Below him, terrified, shaking, Bilbo loses hope.

And Bard has a moment to see the line between them sparkle as bright as it ever was, burning like a fuse, shredding from either end as Bilbo pushes the bond away, pushes his soulmate away from the depths of his heart.

The two points of glittering light draw together, one deep blue, one gold, sparking with the color of the other, and even though there is nothing to see, not really, every face flinches away from the blast of searing white light when the points touch, and the bond dies.

***

Bard hands the stone freely to Fíli amidst the healing tents of the camp. They’re to be kings, and have already sent a party south with gold to seek out food and aid. More is forthcoming, and Bard has no reason to doubt him.

Thorin and Bilbo are gone.

Not dead. They survived the battle, and are together even now, no doubt sitting in shock in a distant tent.

It’s crueler this way.

Death would end the screaming ache that everyone can feel. That everyone pities. That will never let the broken souls rest.

There is no repairing what they have broken. The bond is gone, and will never return.

They will live the rest of their lives in agony, flayed open and raw. Past the veil of death is only a shred of chance that their torture will cease. They’ll likely vanish into the wild together and not return. The pain will be less for them if they are alone together.

Their story will become legend. A warning and a parable told to young children.

Bard is still speaking with Fíli when they both turn as one to the north.

Where two beacons of pain had burned like spires in the air, there is now only one.

Neither moves.

The other point of agony sings out brighter at the loss, then is gone as well.

Like candles snuffed, and like a tendril of smoke still in the air,  Bard can feel the last traces of that pain echoing into silence.

Fíli turns back first, and asks calmly about the needs of the people of Laketown.  


	11. It’s Too Much

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fili.  
> And his feelings.   
> No ships. No warnings.

 

Fili glanced at the little paper tag, and the number scratched on it. He set the bead back down next to it’s match.

Too much.

At least the seller was nice. He didn’t bother the dwarfling as he looked over his wares. He didn’t comment when Fili reached for the simpler ones. He didn’t glower when Fili just kept edging back to fiddle with the prettiest of the beads he sold.

But he did ignore Fili as soon as someone arrived who had a full coin purse.

He just smiled politely when Fili shook his head and walked away.

The seller didn’t notice the bead that was sitting in Fili’s palm. He told himself it was a token, a pledge. A reminder.

One day, he promised himself. One day he would have enough, and he would be able to make it better then. He would be able to make everything better then.

* * *

 

Kili was growing again.

They all knew. It was sort of hard to miss. It seemed like every morning his brother sat down at the table for breakfast taller than he had been the day before.

Growing meant he was hungry. Constantly. Fili remembered being twenty. He remembered snatching rolls from the baker’s cart, and munching on oats as he helped in the stables.

So when he served the porridge around, he gave his brother most of the scoop meant for his own bowl.

“‘m not that hungry this morning.” He said when Kili looked up, confused.

He could make it fine through the day on half a breakfast. He could make it through on less actually. He knew that from experience.

But one day they would be back in Erebor, just like Thorin always promised, and then Fili would eat what he pleased, and make sure that everyone else did as well.

* * *

 

It wasn’t as if his family made no money. Winter was just harder. Thorin and his adad were home during Winter. Two extra mouths was hard to manage, even if they went hunting every time the weather permitted.

The coin just never stretched far enough.

Everything cost more in the Winter too.

Fili had learned that the first time he had been sent to fetch more flour. He had to bargain and threaten and disparage the quality of the goods to convince the Man to sell the flour at a low enough price.

He promised himself as he walked home, with two sacks of flour not three, that one day, he would never have bargain with a merchant again.

* * *

 

When Kili ripped his boot trying to chase down a buck one summer, they both knew they couldn’t take the thing to be mended by the cobbler. So Fili visited the clothier’s guild, and watched the dwarves working for a day. They used tiny steel needles and you almost couldn’t see the stitches.

The stitches Fili made that night with the bone needle he found on the floor were much wider, but he made them as neat as he could.

Neither of them told their parents about it.

Now that Kili had stopped growing, they tried not to ask for new clothes. They didn’t need them that badly.

* * *

 

It wasn’t until after his father died that Fili started to realize that the way they lived wasn’t the way people expected them to live.

He heard all the whispers about the princes growing up without their father, and had to remind himself that they were talking about him and Kili. Most days he didn’t feel like a prince.

No. He never felt like a prince.

Princes were generous and wealthy and happy and lazy.

A few nights later he overheard his mother and uncle talking about the people that lived in Ered Luin. About their needs His mother was adamant they continue as they had. She said that she would be able to cut costs in the home.

Thorin refused, insisted the cut the city’s expenses.

They weren’t happy when Fili joined the conversation.

They were silent when Fili asked them to explain it.

But they were proud when Fili, frustrated but determined, offered to travel with Thorin the next spring, to help fill the gap in income to pay for something he didn’t understand.

He wasn’t an adult, but he was old enough to help.

And it wasn’t right not to help their people.

* * *

 

It was worse outside of the mountain.

He knew it would be, he knew that his uncle and father had not been happy out there. He had known that they lived on as little as they could to be able to bring home a few extra coins.

He already knew how to live on less food. That wasn’t so bad.

He didn’t like overcharging customers, though. He really didn’t like using cheap iron.

As they walked back to the Blue Mountains in fresh snow, he finally asked Thorin what they were paying for with the rest. And he finally got an answer.

“The army defends the city from orcs and marauders. The line of Durin has always paid their wages.”

Fili thought about the sack of coin that seemed so much smaller now, and about the dozens of guards who protected the mountain.

One day, he promised himself, rolling a bead in his pocket, one day, he would be able to make it better.

* * *

 

Fili hadn’t known that there was that much gold in the entire world. He thought that Erebor would have had a few rooms of gold. Certainly more than he had seen. He had expected that.

The wealth of Erebor was beyond measure.

But not beyond use.

His Uncle fell, whispering poetry about the beauty of the play of light on the surface. All Fili could see reflected there was a promise he had made, slowly breaking.

* * *

 

“It’s too much, your highness. I shouldn’t let you pay at all, let alone overpay! Please, take it for free.” The merchant was practically begging him.

Fili smiled, “No, I insist, and I’ll be paying you what I think your wares are worth. This is a cleverly crafted bead.”

“Sir, It’s nothing special. It’s a simple something I brought from Ered Luin, please, let me make you something worthy of you. That one is just a spare, the match was lost somewhere, long ago.”

“No. I like this one.” He set the pile of coins on the table in it’s place and left before he could be asked again to reconsider.

Erebor was theirs again. Two years on, it was alive again. Awake and vibrant and humming with the activity of the the marketplace. The guard was well armed and armored; but they were even better paid.

The traders who brought them grain and meat and luxuries received incentives from the crown itself.

The company, and all those close to him were well outfitted for life.

Fili smiled as he dropped the bead into his pocket with it’s twin.

After everything had been paid out to Bard and Dain, a fourteenth share of the wealth of Erebor wasn’t so much as he had dreamt it would be. He couldn’t quite buy and sell the world, but he could keep his promises.

 

 

 


	12. Routine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo/Thorin  
> Canon Compliant  
> But only sort of

Nothing changes in the Shire.

It’s why he came back. Everywhere else it is a new world. It is a new day, it is a new dawn breaking over a glorious future, and the world is reeling from the change.

Not in the Shire.

Life goes on.

Except for when it doesn’t.

Life goes on. So does death.

There isn’t any changing that.

The East is rising. The blight is lifting.

The forest is blooming.

The mountain is rebuilding.

The elves are celebrating.

The dwarves are returning.

The ring is destroyed.

The world is changed.

As she said it would be.

As they promised Bilbo it would be.

It’s how they think they convinced him. That’s not true. He went because of him, and because he had failed once and could not bring himself to do so again. He went because he would have said it was the right thing to do.

Now everything has changed, and the only thing he wishes different can never change.

So he has come home to the Shire, anonymous.

They do not know what he has done, or what they now call him.

In the Shire, nothing ever changes.

So Bilbo can pretend it never happened.

Here, there is nothing more dangerous than the hail, than the winter. Here there is nothing wrong except the beetles in the potatoes.

He came back to the Shire because everything would be the same.

And it is.

And it hurts.

He has visitors sometimes. They ask him where he went. They ask him what he saw. They ask him what he did. They ask him how he is.

     East. Then South.

     The world.

     Many things.

     Fine.

They don’t deserve the answers they ask for.

     Erebor. Then Mordor.

     Life and death and love.

     Betrayed a friend and watched him die. Destroyed a ring.

     Torn open inside.

So he keeps them to himself. He hoards them and he guards them and he wishes he could trade them away and know of nothing more painful than an early frost.

Nothing changes in the Shire you see.

And yet, Bilbo is changed. So now he’ll never fit back into his place at home.

There isn’t any way to change the course of his life now.

He hoped as he ran out the door that day that this would change him.

Gandalf did promise that.

He thinks now that this is worse.

Boring wasn’t so bad. Alone wasn’t so bad.

The books he reads, they still tell the same lies. They still say that he should be glad to have tasted, glad to have seen, glad to have gone, glad to have felt. Glad to have known.

That’s not true.

It just makes the lack now worse.

So much worse.

Sometimes he has grander visitors than hobbits.

They don’t ask the first questions. They already know those answers. They were there. They were the ones who watched and realized and begged.

All they want to know is the last.

How are you Bilbo? they ask each time. Do you need anything Bilbo? they repeat. Is there anything that you desire? they prod. Are you doing well? they attempt.

     Fine.

     Nothing.

     Not at all.

     Of course.

They don’t deserve the answers they ask for.

     Terrible.

     Him.

     Only Him.

     Why would I be doing well?

They don’t deserve to know the truth. They who let it happen. They who watched and did nothing to stop it and then asked him for yet more.

The elves, the men, the dwarves, the ranger from the North, the wizards who he hates the most. The Lady he shuts the door on.

They don’t ask about him. Of course they don’t.

They have more tact than he ever did.

Maybe it’s because they all know the truth that’s as unchangeable as the Shire.

There is no reunion for him. Not for him. Not even if he was wanted, there is no light at the end of his life with a figure standing inside it. There is no chance. No changing that.

Not for Bilbo.

Not for a hobbit.

Not even after he changed the world. Saved the world, they say.

Well, he has earned the right to be greedy after what he has paid. He has the right to keep to himself that last grain of truth.

So the answers remain the same. Fine. Fine. Nothing at all. Don’t worry. Everything is fine. I’m fine.

If he leaves the Shire and faces the world he will have to accept the change. He’ll have to admit that he cannot bury himself so deeply in the perpetual, permanent Shire that one day he will wake and have forgotten it all. So he stays.

He hates it. But he stays.

The Lady comes back. She invites him along when they sail. He is a ringbearer, she says. He deserves his peace, she says.

Is he there?

She doesn’t lie.

He shuts the door again.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

>  You can come harass [Moo](http://andalusa.tumblr.com/) and [Myself](http://striving-artist.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr


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